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I was Death, harvesting lives. I knew my destiny was epic. Yet I killed one at a time, one at a time, one at a time. If my killing spree had been music—and it was music to me—you could rightly call it the simplest folk song. But I had set out to create a symphony of death, an immortal opera of terror .
Then an unexpected encounter suddenly led me to understand that to fulfill my promise, to unleash my full potential, to compose truly memorable crescendos of destruction, I must kill entire families, use them first as I wished and then slaughter them. In killing any family, I was killing my own, which deserved to die .
Inspiration can come from surprising sources. A child showed me the way .
—from the journal of Alton Turner Blackwood
1989
A WEEK BEFORE HIS ELEVENTH BIRTHDAY, WHEN Howie Dugley climbed to the roof of the former Boswell’s Emporium to watch normal people doingall kinds of ordinary things along Maple Street, he saw the monster for the first time.
Howie’s family lived only two blocks from the building in which Boswell’s had formerly done business. He could get there by crossing the cemetery beside St. Anthony’s Church and then following a cobbled alleyway that seldom had traffic. Huge scarlet oaks, glossy green now in mid-June, shaded the graveyard. Howie liked the trees. They lived longer than people, and they seemed wise to him, wiser than people would ever be, because they had seen so much and they had nothing to do but think about what they had seen and then grow ever bigger. He wished he could just sit under them for a while or even climb them, climb up into the quiet wisdom of the trees. But that was too risky. That would be asking to have his butt kicked. He got plenty of butt-kicking without asking for it.
As he made his way through the cemetery, in addition to all the tree shadows, headstones and monuments provided some cover. He wore a baseball cap, kept his head down, and was prepared to avert the left side of his face from anyone he might encounter—and to run if he spotted any of the usual goons.
Nine months earlier, Boswell’s moved into a new building a block north of its former quarters. The old brick structure would in time be remodeled for some new business; but that work hadn’t begun yet.
Along the bottom of the back wall were fiveFrench windows, each two feet high and three long, which looked into the basement of the emporium. They had been opened from time to time to ventilate that lower space, to prevent mildew, in the days before air-conditioning and dehumidifiers. All five seemed to be locked, but when Howie pushed hard on the middle one, the corroded piano hinge along the top moved with a dry grinding noise. He slid feetfirst through the opening, into the gloomy cellar, and then reached high to press the window shut.
Clipped to his belt was a small flashlight, which he used to navigate the former storerooms of the vacant basement. The narrow beam picked out his path, but it did little to brighten the musty chambers through which he passed. Menaces unknown appeared to creep and quiver in the darkness around him, but those phantoms were nothing more than shadows shuddering away from the traveling light and billowing back after it passed. Howie wasn’t afraid of darkness. He had learned young that the dangers in bright daylight were worse than anything that might wait in the dark, that the bogeyman could have a kind face and a winning smile.
The elevator no longer worked. He climbed stairs to the fourth floor and then ascended a final flight, steeper and narrower than those before it. These last stairs led into the lid-service room, which was a kind of shed on the flat roof of the building. Here were stored snow shovels, push brooms, other tools, and products that the maintenance staff required.
Although Howie always engaged the deadbolt on the outer door when departing the roof, he found it unlocked. Apparently, he had forgotten the bolt on his previous visit. He
I was Death, harvesting lives. I knew my destiny was epic. Yet I killed one at a time, one at a time, one at a time. If my killing spree had been music—and it was music to me—you could rightly call it the simplest folk song. But I had set out to create a symphony of death, an immortal opera of terror .
Then an unexpected encounter suddenly led me to understand that to fulfill my promise, to unleash my full potential, to compose truly memorable crescendos of destruction, I must kill entire families, use them first as I wished and then slaughter them. In killing any family, I was killing my own, which deserved to die .
Inspiration can come from surprising sources. A child showed me the way .
—from the journal of Alton Turner Blackwood
1989
A WEEK BEFORE HIS ELEVENTH BIRTHDAY, WHEN Howie Dugley climbed to the roof of the former Boswell’s Emporium to watch normal people doingall kinds of ordinary things along Maple Street, he saw the monster for the first time.
Howie’s family lived only two blocks from the building in which Boswell’s had formerly done business. He could get there by crossing the cemetery beside St. Anthony’s Church and then following a cobbled alleyway that seldom had traffic. Huge scarlet oaks, glossy green now in mid-June, shaded the graveyard. Howie liked the trees. They lived longer than people, and they seemed wise to him, wiser than people would ever be, because they had seen so much and they had nothing to do but think about what they had seen and then grow ever bigger. He wished he could just sit under them for a while or even climb them, climb up into the quiet wisdom of the trees. But that was too risky. That would be asking to have his butt kicked. He got plenty of butt-kicking without asking for it.
As he made his way through the cemetery, in addition to all the tree shadows, headstones and monuments provided some cover. He wore a baseball cap, kept his head down, and was prepared to avert the left side of his face from anyone he might encounter—and to run if he spotted any of the usual goons.
Nine months earlier, Boswell’s moved into a new building a block north of its former quarters. The old brick structure would in time be remodeled for some new business; but that work hadn’t begun yet.
Along the bottom of the back wall were fiveFrench windows, each two feet high and three long, which looked into the basement of the emporium. They had been opened from time to time to ventilate that lower space, to prevent mildew, in the days before air-conditioning and dehumidifiers. All five seemed to be locked, but when Howie pushed hard on the middle one, the corroded piano hinge along the top moved with a dry grinding noise. He slid feetfirst through the opening, into the gloomy cellar, and then reached high to press the window shut.
Clipped to his belt was a small flashlight, which he used to navigate the former storerooms of the vacant basement. The narrow beam picked out his path, but it did little to brighten the musty chambers through which he passed. Menaces unknown appeared to creep and quiver in the darkness around him, but those phantoms were nothing more than shadows shuddering away from the traveling light and billowing back after it passed. Howie wasn’t afraid of darkness. He had learned young that the dangers in bright daylight were worse than anything that might wait in the dark, that the bogeyman could have a kind face and a winning smile.
The elevator no longer worked. He climbed stairs to the fourth floor and then ascended a final flight, steeper and narrower than those before it. These last stairs led into the lid-service room, which was a kind of shed on the flat roof of the building. Here were stored snow shovels, push brooms, other tools, and products that the maintenance staff required.
Although Howie always engaged the deadbolt on the outer door when departing the roof, he found it unlocked. Apparently, he had forgotten the bolt on his previous visit. He
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